Pentium 4 3.46 Extreme Edition and 925XE: 1066MHz FSB Support is Here
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 31, 2004 3:00 PM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Cheap - High End: Athlon 64 3800+ vs. Pentium 4 560
This entire review has been focused on comparing processors that retail either close to or over $1000 since they are flagship chips, but what about the next price class down? There's a very interesting situation here with the most expensive non-EE Pentium 4 being significantly cheaper than the highest end non-FX Athlon 64 processors.
Using our RealTime Pricing Engine we pitted the bargain high end Pentium 4 560, going for $440, against the more expensive Athlon 64 3800+ which is still selling for just over $600. So which CPU is the better choice if you want performance almost as good as the high end chips, but at a much more reasonable price? Let's find out.
First we've got the business/general use application tests; with AMD taking five of the benchmarks and Intel taking three, the score card is pretty close between the two, however AMD does win by higher margins so the nod goes to AMD here. However, once you take into account the price difference between the two CPUs, AMD's margin of victory is cut into. Despite the price argument, we'll still give the crown here to AMD.
Business/General Use | |||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
|
Business Winstone 2004 | 21.4
|
23.6
|
AMD
(10.2%)
|
SYSMark 2004 - Communication | 144
|
139
|
Intel
(3.6%)
|
SYSMark 2004 - Document Creation | 201
|
194
|
Intel
(3.6%)
|
SYSMark 2004 - Data Analysis | 184
|
145
|
Intel
(27%)
|
Microsoft Office XP with SP-2 | 522
|
520
|
Tie
|
Mozilla 1.4 | 459
|
316
|
AMD
(31.2%)
|
ACD Systems ACDSee PowerPack 5.0 | 547
|
490
|
AMD
(10.4%)
|
Ahead Software Nero Express 6.0.0.3 | 540
|
491
|
AMD
(9%)
|
WinZip Computing WinZip 8.1 | 412
|
409
|
Tie
|
WinRAR | 479
|
617
|
AMD
(28.8%)
|
Winner | AMD
|
Under our Multitasking Content Creation tests Intel comes away with three wins, and AMD with two. One of AMD's victories is in a test with a fairly high margin of error reducing the real world performance advantage; factor in the lower CPU cost and Intel wins this one.
Multitasking Content Creation | |||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
|
Content Creation Winstone 2004 | 32.7
|
35.3
|
AMD
(8%)
|
SYSMark 2004 - 3D Creation | 231
|
205
|
Intel
(12.7%)
|
SYSMark 2004 - 2D Creation | 288
|
265
|
Intel
(8.7%)
|
SYSMark 2004 - Web Publication | 206
|
188
|
Intel
(9.6%)
|
Multitasking: Mozilla and Windows Media Encoder | 676
|
590
|
AMD
(12.7%)
|
Winner | Intel
|
AMD wins two, Intel wins one, factor in variance between tests and AMD still comes out ahead by a reasonable margin. AMD wins the performance crown here, but its debatable whether or not the performance advantage is worth the price.
Video Creation/Photo Editing | ||||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
||
Adobe Photoshop 7.0.1 | 342
|
315
|
AMD
(7.9%)
|
|
Adobe Premiere 6.5 | 461
|
371
|
AMD
(19.5%)
|
|
Roxio VideoWave Movie Creator 1.5 | 287
|
310
|
Intel
(7.4%)
|
|
Winner | AMD
|
Intel wins the A/V encoding tests hands down, barely losing one of the tests.
Audio/Video Encoding | ||||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
||
MusicMatch Jukebox 7.10 | 484
|
458
|
AMD
(5.4%)
|
|
DivX Encoding | 55.3
|
47.9
|
Intel
(15.4%)
|
|
XV Encoding | 33.9
|
32.6
|
Intel
(4%)
|
|
Microsoft Windows Media Encoder 9.0 | 2.57
|
2.21
|
Intel
(16.3%)
|
|
Winner | Intel
|
There's no argument here, the 3800+ is clearly the faster gaming processor.
Gaming | |||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
|
Doom 3 | 84.6
|
97.3
|
AMD
(15%)
|
Sims 2 | 47.3
|
55.4
|
AMD
(17.1%)
|
CS: Source | 142.8
|
171.6
|
AMD
(20.2%)
|
Halo | 87.5
|
95
|
AMD
(8.6%)
|
Far Cry | 130.3
|
151.4
|
AMD
(16.2%)
|
Star Wars Battlefront | 140
|
144
|
AMD
(2.9%)
|
Battlefield Vietnam | 236
|
240
|
AMD
(1.7%)
|
UT2004 | 59.3
|
67.6
|
AMD
(14%)
|
Wolf: ET | 97.2
|
107.1
|
AMD
(10%)
|
Warcraft III | 60
|
62
|
AMD
(3.3%)
|
Winner | AMD
|
AMD wins two benchmarks by less than 5%, while Intel wins one benchmark by less than 7%. We'll call this one a toss up between the two in performance, but factor in price and Intel wins.
3D Rendering | |||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
|
Discreet 3ds max 5.1 (DirectX) | 267
|
254
|
AMD
(4.9%)
|
Discreet 3ds max 5.1 (OpenGL) | 327
|
312
|
AMD
(4.6%)
|
SPECapc 3dsmax 6 | 1.64
|
1.54
|
Intel
(6.5%)
|
Winner | Tie
|
For 3D Professional applications AMD takes the clear lead, not to mention a significant advantage in compiler performance as well. The added cost of the Athlon 64 is well worth it in some of the tests, but is more questionable in others.
Professional Apps | |||
Intel
Pentium 4 560
|
AMD
Athlon 64 3800+
|
Winner
|
|
SPECviewperf 8 - 3dsmax-03 | 17.04
|
16.75
|
Intel
(1.7%)
|
SPECviewperf 8 - catia-01 | 13.87
|
14.03
|
AMD
(1.2%)
|
SPECviewperf 8 - light-07 | 14.3
|
14.3
|
Tie
|
SPECviewperf 8 - maya-01 | 13.12
|
18.58
|
AMD
(41.6%)
|
SPECviewperf 8 - proe-03 | 16.7
|
17.19
|
AMD
(2.9%)
|
SPECviewperf 8 - sw-01 | 13.09
|
13.72
|
AMD
(4.8%)
|
SPECviewperf 8 - ugs-04 | 15.31
|
16
|
AMD
(4.5%)
|
Visual Studio 6 | 16.8
|
13.1
|
AMD
(22.0%)
|
Winner | AMD
|
So in the end, who takes the crown? AMD or Intel? The 3800+ took four category wins, while the Pentium 4 560 only took two, however with the exception of the gaming and professional apps category, AMD's victories were not overwhelming - especially once you take into account the fact that the 3800+ is priced much higher than the Pentium 4 560. Now that you can purchase at least a couple of 915 based motherboards for less than $130 the total cost of ownership for the Intel platform doesn't eat into the CPU price advantage. For the most part we'd say the 3800+ is faster than the Pentium 4 560 but not always worth the added cost. It's unusual but in many cases, the Pentium 4 560 is actually the bargain high-end chip of the two.
63 Comments
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Beenthere - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
Intel has simply run out of Hail Mary solutions to their unending design, engineering, production, sales, management, and marketing problems. Even Wall Street knows this by now.Wesley Fink - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
For those who asked, the 1000 lot Intel price for the 3.46EE is $999.coldpower27 - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
Well you could get a direct comparison between the Athlon 64 3700+ vs the Pentium 4 560 as those 2 processors are priced pretty directly against each other on Newegg, though their MSRP differ in actuality.64Bit Windows isn't likely to be released until Prescott 2M with Intel EM64T is released in Q1 2005. We will have to see though if Microsoft will released in 2005 WinXP 64.
jimmy43 - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
#14 I was thinking the same thing. The 3500 would probably still win or tie in most of the categories and it costs nearly half the price of an intel 560. I feel like Anand is trying to be fair to both companies and reccomending a bit of both. Realistically, AMD has Intel beat in every market segment... by alot. It's also funny how everyone is COMPLETELY forgetting that AMD's proccessors are 64 bit so in a year or so, you will get a considerable free speed boost and youl be able to run the latest OS. Is that not a huge advantage? Come on, people need to stop overlooking that its really bugging me.DukeN - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
Once again, Intel shows why it's the Sony of the CPU world with terrible products terribly overpriced.Gnoad - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
I might have missed it, but how much will Intel price this at? Considering it's an EE, one can guess about $900. If thats true, they MIGHT sell 3 or 4 of them.skunkbuster - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
underdog in terms of market shareGhandiInstinct - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
Since when did the world spin where a chip that is superior in 90% of chip tasks is the underdog?stephenbrooks - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
So... I was thinking of investing some money in shares. You don't think AMD might happen to be a good bet right around now, would you?SLIM - Sunday, October 31, 2004 - link
Great review as always, but there's always room for improvement:)[/begin nitpicking]
"So in the end, who takes the crown? AMD or Intel? The 3800+ took four category wins, while the Pentium 4 560 only took two, however with the exception of the gaming and professional apps category, AMD's victories were not overwhelming - especially once you take into account the fact that the 3800+ is priced much higher than the Pentium 4 560. Now that you can purchase at least a couple of 915 based motherboards for less than $130 the total cost of ownership for the Intel platform doesn't eat into the CPU price advantage. For the most part we'd say the 3800+ is faster than the Pentium 4 560 but not always worth the added cost. It's unusual but in many cases, the Pentium 4 560 is actually the bargain high-end chip of the two."
Alrighty, two comments:
1) It's bad science to make a detailed comparison, and then in the conclusion talk about switching the chipset and memory in order to make the price comparison hold up. (Maybe include the numbers from a 915 review to back up the assertion that the 560 will still perform just as well with 915/DDR).
2) I'd be curious to see how the 3500+ would hold up in these same comparisons since it is about $150 cheaper than the 560.
Bonus nitpick:
4 of the graphs don't include the new 3.46ee (ACD on page 9 and 3 games benches); I don't know if that was intentional or not. [/end nitpicking]
Thanks again for the best reviews.